August 30, 2006

Beach Livin' in the Nam

The road from Da Lat to Nha Trang was long and winding, but interesting. The scenery went from lush
to desert-like
to salty
before we ever saw the ocean. But once we did, I was so grateful to be out of the mountains and back in the tropics.

Nha Trang is a breath of fresh air coming from Vietnam's south. It's a major coastal town and has that bright, lofty, pastel air about it. In fact, the city reminds me a lot of Santa Monica, Calfornia, which is weird. It's not like I didn't try to get as far away as possible or anything.

Nha Trang's beach is slightly dirty
and you'll never have it to yourself, but the water
is warm and calm, you can rent a couple of chairs under a thatched roof
for a couple bucks, and the fruit lady
never wanders too far off. I was wondering how the whole beach culture vibe was going to work, given the obvious aversion Vietnamese people have to the sun. But it's all good, they just flock to the beach when the sun goes down.

Lay on the beach, read, rinse, repeat. That's all we did for a few days. It rocked.

But then we got bored. Brendan had a bright idea to rent a motorbike, which really did seem like a good idea at the time. Once he was driving and I was hanging off the back for dear life, my change of heart was remarkable.

About five minutes into the ride from hell (it wasn't really hell but I'm deathly afraid of motorcycles, and then there I am riding on the back of one sans helmet like some floozy who doesn't know any better), the bike stalled out. In the middle of an intersection, mind you. We walked it to safety on the side of the road, where as luck would have it, a very nice man
took pity on us and went to work trying to fix the engine.

The final verdict was that we ran out of gas. Five minutes after renting the motorcycle we ran out of gas. The fuel gauge said full. That's Vietnam for you.

Our Vietnam Rough Guide suggested a place about an hour north of Nha Trang called Jungle Beach Resort, promising a better coastline with less traffic. After several days of being completely spoiled by surf and sun, looking for perfection was really the only logical choice we had left. So we packed up and headed up
to Jungle Beach.

Even though it's called a resort, Jungle Beach
is more like a tropical campsite. Guests sleep in open-air bamboo huts
without electricity and share bathrooms. The place has the potential to be a five-star joint, but there's an allure to its modesty. For $15 per person per night, you have your run of the place and three delicious meals
prepared by the owners and their staff. Hands down the best food we've had in all of Asia. I was torn between thanking my lucky stars that I was temporarily living in utopia (that little speck out in the water is me) and wishing our hut had A/C. I know that sounds selfish, but I must stress how hot it was. Like an oven at 7 am. A wet oven.

The owner, Sylvio, recently spotted a group (pack? tribe? gaggle?) of monkeys living in the mountains nearby, and now primate researchers from all over the world are coming to Jungle Beach to study them. Apparently there aren't monkeys like these monkeys anywhere else on Earth and experts are sort of freaking out about the discovery. At dusk, Sylvio would spot a monkey or two with binoculars and yell for anybody who wasn't still out swimming
to come take a look. One evening I saw baby monkeys and almost cried.

Unfortunately, we had to say goodbye to Jungle Beach after five days of bliss. Even though we're traveling for a year, the world is a big place full of many more utopias. Though the rickety old bus we tried to sleep on during the twelve-hour journey north to Hoi An was definitely not one of them.

Hoi An itself, however, is fabulous. Can you believe I'm actually caught up and writing this blog while still technically inside Hoi An? Hooray! Anyway, the town is cute, dusty, and awfully charming. It's known mostly for its local art galleries
and tailor shops which line the streets
to the point of redundancy, though somehow the place manages not to feel too tacky. We took the bait and bought a framed painting to ship back home, Brendan got a suit made, and I walked away with a silk jacket or three.

Many of the hotels here are cheap and dumpy, but we splurged ($25/night) on a moderately luxurious one
with a pool. B
can usually be found in or near the pool between breakfast and dinner. I, on the other hand, am usually hanging out in the lobby enjoying free wifi. The hotel staff must think I'm the most boring person alive. It's kind of embarrassing.

Being completely flat and without a lot of motorized traffic, Hoi An's the perfect place to ride a bicycle. Today we rented two bikes
and rode about 5 miles out to Cua Dai beach, which was nice but not spectacular after Jungle Beach (though we did have the whole thing to ourselves). Afterwards, we pedaled back into town and killed a few hours taking pictures and drinking lassis. Today was technically our last day of leisure in Vietnam, since tomorrow morning we head into Laos! I'm so excited. The bus leaves at 7 am and 30 hours later we should roll safe and sound into Savannakhet. Here's hoping.

Your Friend,Sarah

PS- There's a "Huff" marathon on HBO in our hotel room right now. Best show ever. Who's with me?

Comments

So, here's how I ended up at this blog: I'm channel surfing with my brother, jumping between "Mythbusters", "Ham On The Street(FoodTV)", and "X-Play". The discussion went from Adam Sessler's B-day episode to past "The Screen Savers" episodes/hosts to Brendan Moran. It came up that my brother did not know that you, formerly-known-as Ms. Sarah Lane, had married said Mr. Moran. To prove it to my brother, we wiki-ed your name and boom! Sarah Lane is no more. In her stead, Mrs. Sarah Moran, 1/2 The Traveling Morans. A click later and I'm reading about a trip through Vietnam, my parents' home country. Including the pics from my parents' recent trip there, your pics blew my mind. A few more clicks and I found the podcasts you two were making. I have to admit that after hearing and seeing your cheerful voice and face on Episode 6(Russia. It Ain't Turkey.), you've stolen my heart yet again Ms. Lane(sorry, Mrs. Moran). Rest assured, I will be subscribing to the vidcast. I wish you two a safe return, and Brendan Moran is one lucky S.O.B.

I understand that free wifi deal, I'm always hanging around this cofee place we have in town. They think I'm boring too. You guys got lucky, two out of three beaches you had to yourselves. The beaches I go to, FL and CA, are always so dirty and full of people. Plus the water is never too clean.

I found out I'll be going to Europe this summer. Me and a group of friends will go to Paris, London, Berlin, etc. It should be awesome. I'm gonna have to get a good camera like you guys.

Keep looking for the hotspots so you can keep us updated. I'm off to Brendan's blog to find out if he's updated.

to Rev Jason HBO owns showtime so in asia all they get is HBO and to sarah those are some sweet looking pictures as a photographer I must say that is some of the best quality I've seen in a while I'll be wait for your next post cheers

My new hubby and I are off to Hawaii on Tuesday for our honeymoon (it's not 13 months long, sadly) and now I find myself wishing we had booked a trip to Jungle Beach instead! :) Those pictures were lovely. Wish I could've seen the baby monkey too!

I'm wondering what Brendan thinks of the "B" nickname. My wife used to call me Joe-Bee, and I thought it was cute for almost two whole days. Anyway, I hope that 30 hour (!) bus ride goes well. Wallace and Gromit is on HBO again, so I gotta go.

I was at the same places two years ago and reading your post brought back a lot of fond memories. Too bad about the weather in Dalat. It's a really nice town and is known among the locals as the honeymooner's town. There's even a place called Lover's Valley, which has beautiful waterfalls. Best of luck in the rest of your travels.

Jungle Beach looks beautiful! I've never been outside the United States. I'm so jealous! I wonder how hard it is not understanding almost everyone? It really is great that you two have taken the time to travel the world! Will you two come back to the attack of the show when you are done? The AOTS fans miss you both! Enjoy your trip, and always love each other! ~Rob~